THE WHITE LIONS

SUNDAY, JUNE 7 @ 10:00PM

White lions are among the rarest and most treasured animals in the world. Rarer still is their survival in the wild. Their white color stands out in Africa’s wild bush country, increasing their risk of being targeted and killed by rival predators and marauding adult male lions.

Used primarily for communication and camouflage, color is one of nature’s most dependable defenses. White lions lose the ability to blend in to their surroundings, exposing them to other predators as well as jeopardizing their own ability to hunt.

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AMERICAN MASTERS

MONDAY, MAY 20 @ 7:00PM & 11:00PM

After 60 years in show business, Mel Brooks has earned more major awards than any other living entertainer; he is one of 14 EGOT (Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony) winners. Yet, the comedy giant has energetically avoided a documentary profile being made, even issuing an informal gag order on his friends … until now. Brooks agreed to throw himself into a new documentary about his storied career, giving American Masters exclusive interviews and complete access to his film and photo archives.

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MR. SELFRIDGE

SEASON FINALE

SUNDAY, MAY 19 @ 10:00PM

In Episode 8 of Mr. Selfridge, tragedy strikes on the day polar explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton comes to the store. An even greater celebrity plans a visit, and Harry and Rose attend a shocking play.

Jeremy Piven (Entourage) stars in Mr. Selfridge as a wheeling-dealing American who shows early 1900s Londoners how to shop. Based on the life of colorful retail magnate Harry Gordon Selfridge, the new eight-part series is created by Emmy® Award-winning writer Andrew Davies(Pride and Prejudice, Bleak House). Also starring are Frances O’Connor (Madame Bovary), Aisling Loftus (Page Eight), Zoe Tapper (Zen), Amanda Abbington (Case Histories), and Samuel West (Any Human Heart).

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SEASON FINALE

SUNDAY, MAY 19 @ 6:00PM & 10:00PM

Chummy and PC Noakes meet with new challenges as they settle back into life in Poplar. Fred is in high spirits when his pregnant daughter, Dolly arrives to stay with him. Jenny’s has a potential love interest. Old buildings are demolished to make new way for new flats, a situation that reaches crisis point when the convent comes under threat.

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WITH GWEN IFILL

FRIDAY, MAY 17 @ 9:00PM

Scandal Fallout: IRS, Benghazi and Justice Probes Reporters

A trifecta of troubles dogged the Obama administration this week. There was the continuing fallout from the deadly attacks on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya. Then news broke that the Internal Revenue Service has been targeting conservative groups when they applied for tax exempt status. And finally it was revealed that the Justice Department had secretly seized the telephone records of Associated Press reporters as part of an investigation into classified leaks.

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AT THE MET

RIGOLETTO

SATURDAY, MAY 18 @ 6:00PM

Tony Award-winning director Michael Mayer (Spring Awakening) makes his Met debut with a new production of Verdi’s Rigoletto. The new staging moves the opera’s tragic events from a decadent 16th-century Italian court to the glitzy, depraved setting of the Las Vegas strip circa 1960, and airs on Great Performances at the Mettonight on MCPTV 26.1 !

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CAVEMEN COLD CASE

WEDNESDAY, MAY 15 @ 11:00PM

A tomb of 49,000 year-old Neanderthal bones discovered in El Sidron, a remote, mountainous region of Northern Spain, leads to a compelling investigation to solve a double mystery: How did this group of Neanderthals die? And, could the fate of this group help explain Neanderthal extinction? Scientists examine the bones—buried over 65 feet below ground—and discover signs that tell a shocking story of how this group of six adults, three teenagers, two children and a baby may have met their death. Some bones have deep cuts, long bones are cracked and skulls crushed—distinct signs of cannibalism.

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GREAT ZEBRA EXODUS

SUNDAY, MARCH 26 @ 10:00PM

Botswana’s Makgadikgadi Pans are home to the largest zebra population in southern Africa, but it’s not an easy life. There is no permanent water in the arid saltpans, so thousands of zebras are dependent on isolated summer rains for their survival. Fleeting thundershowers produce islands of grass scattered across the otherwise barren landscape.

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with PETER SAGAL

BUILT TO LAST?

TUESDAY, MAY 28 @ 7:00PM & 12:00AM

EPISODE 4

Ask Americans what the Constitution’s most important feature is, and most will say it’s the guarantees of liberty enshrined in the Bill of Rights, the first ten amendments of the Constitution.

Americans are fiercely proud of their freedoms but they continue to argue about what those basic rights are and how they can be sustained in a changing world. Are our rights unchangeable, or should they evolve over time? What is the proper role for the courts in interpreting rights?

Peter travels to Iceland where a few years after the country’s economic collapse, leaders decided to create a new constitution, turning to the U.S. Constitution for inspiration and guidance. This prompts Peter to consider the extraordinary longevity of our own founding document. He’ll talk to a variety of Americans, including Justice Sandra Day O’Connor about why the Constitution, famously brief and full of vague language, has survived for more than two and a quarter centuries.

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THE INVISIBLE WAR

MONDAY, JANUARY 6 @ 8:00PM

The most shameful and best-kept secret in the U.S. military? The epidemic of rape and sexual assault within the ranks. An American female soldier in a combat zone is more likely to be raped by a fellow soldier than killed by enemy fire. A culture of privilege and impunity has resulted in few prosecutions, and the systematic isolation of women — and men — who dare report the crimes.

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